Apple improves Siri to integrate with third party apps

Apple have announced a whole lot of exciting new advancements to their four key platforms; Apple Watch, OS X, TVOS and of course iOS at Monday’s WWDC 2016. Amongst the line up were things such as Apple Pay for Mac, enabling you to make in browser purchases with synced touch ID on your iPhone. They also announced a universal dashboard, copy text or a photo on your phone and easily paste from your computer.

One thing that stood out was the work being done on Siri. In the past Siri has been an easy target for all kinds of parodies and comedic channels online. Compared to other industry players like Amazon, Google and Microsoft it has taken it’s time to put skin in the game and really step up. So how should we expect to see Siri change in the updates around iOS and macOS?

Well a major step is that Siri will now be available on the Mac. It was an expected development making Siri Mac ready, and they’ve delivered. This means you can do all the things you can on your phone and more. Search for files or browse the web, make a call and send messages and play music.

All that aside, Apple’s release with the biggest potential is making Siri available for third party apps, resulting in a plethora of uses for our trusty friend. This opens up a whole market that will see Siri working with platforms like Slack, WeChat, WhatsApp and ride booking with services like Uber or photo search with apps like Pinterest. In classic Apple style, they are limiting what developers can do, but there is no harm in planting seeds of possibility. Perhaps you’ll even see SalesSeek iOS app integrate Siri. You’ll soon have a talking CRM assistant who you can ask ‘What’s my hottest deal?’ ‘How many leads have I got today?’, or ‘Mark my XYZ Deal as Won’. The potential for sales people on the move is huge, putting your key accounts just a ‘Hey Siri’ away.

Apple have also spent some time to educate Siri a little more. It is now able to take a range of commands in many different ways, allowing a more human conversation when asking Siri to carry out a certain task.

“Send a WeChat to Olivia saying I’ll be five minutes late.” Could be said “Tell Olivia I’ll be five minutes late with WeChat,” and even “Siri, can you shoot a message on WeChat and say I’ll be five minutes late?”

You might have also read our post earlier this year about the rise in bots and what is expected for the near future. With Apple updating their iMessage app in iOS 10 you will now be able to order food, buy clothes or a holiday through the messaging app. This will come with a whole new app store for iMessage, clearly just the beginning of many possibilities, especially for businesses who need to sell in new creative ways.

With all of these changes having huge potential to affect how businesses sell and reach customers, we are first on the list of beta testers to get a feel for the new OS. SalesSeek is always looking to improve the experience for our customers and we’d encourage you to do the same.

Harry is a recent addition to the SalesSeek team. He has experience working with community arts organisations as well as the communities in which they exist, social enterprise and people that want to change the world. As Marketing Assistant at SalesSeek he will be drawing on his wide range of experience to bring a new perspective to the company.